As a materials scientist, Alexandra Navrotsky studies the forces that shape atoms into structures. As a new Davis faculty member, she's exerting a substantial force of her own, uniting departments across campus in innovative collaborations. "She is quite remarkable in her ability to galvanize faculty into joint efforts," says mathematical and physical sciences dean Peter Rock, who led the effort last year to recruit Navrotsky away from Princeton University. "She's demonstrated that to a very significant degree in the short time she's been here." Since her arrival in April, Navrotsky has launched Nanophases in the Environment, Agriculture and Technology, a cross-disciplinary research program she devised for Davis before she was even sure of her appointment. She has also led faculty from half a dozen campus departments through the preliminary steps of seeking $10 million from the National Science Foundation to establish a Materials Science Research and Engineering Center here. In the meantime, she has worked to finish construction of her new calorimetry labs, which will measure the informative small heat effects that occur during high-temperature chemical reactions. Much of the complex equipment was designed and built by Navrotsky's research team, and is expected to attract scientists to Davis from around the world. Navrotsky helped found a materials-science facility at Princeton, where she was a professor from 1985 to 1996. Before that, she was on the faculty at Arizona State University for 16 years and was director of its Center for Solid State Science. At Davis, Navrotsky's role as team-builder is implicit in her appointments to four departments -- a rarity on any campus and a first here. Her primary appointment is in chemical engineering and materials science in the College of Engineering, and she also is appointed to the departments of chemistry and geology (College of Letters and Science) and land, air and water resources (College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences). Relevant in many fields Her research has relevance for many fields. "The question that has fascinated me all my life," Navrotsky says, "is this: What is it about the essential properties of atoms and molecules that says why, under certain conditions of temperature, pressure and composition, you get a particular material and not some other?" And in her 30-year career, Navrotsky has produced answers that can apply to a vast number of problems, from nuclear-waste storage to oxide superconductors to the nature of Earth's deep interior. At Davis, she says, the conditions are right for attacking many such subjects collaboratively. "Davis is unique in that it has tradition and strength in agriculture and environmental sciences. So we have the soil scientists, microbiologists, environmental scientists, geochemists and we have the materials-science people. "And I don't think people have fully realized that in many cases they're all working on the same problem." One of those common problems is a current Navrotsky favorite: the nature of nanophases -- solid particles so small that most of their atoms are at or near the surface. In chemical reactions, surfaces are where the action is. With so much surface reactivity, nanophases be-have differently from bulk materials. "They will behave in ways we don't ful-ly understand," Nav-rotsky says. "And we don't know the size scale at which their behavior deviates from the ordinary, or whether the new phenomenon comes in at a specific size or comes in gradually." In environmental studies, nanophase research could reveal how contaminants spread in rivers and lakes. In agriculture, it could lead to soils that retain water better. In technology, it could bring more efficient production of ceramic and electronic parts, reducing costs and environmental impact. In geology, it could improve models of planetary evolution and climate change. She's like a nanophase herself If anyone can pry apart the nanophase problem, it should be Navrotsky. She is direct and no-nonsense. In her 6,000-square-foot suite on the fourth floor of the Chemistry Annex, she rather resembles a nanophase: Her surface, too, is fairly reactive. When a photographer taking her picture asks to move a packing crate, not knowing it holds delicate equipment worth $60,000, Navrotsky lectures him on the sensitive nature of a research facility. "Never touch anything," she says sternly. The crate cannot be moved. "No way. Don't even think of it. Too bad." In the hall outside, she encounters a senior scientist who has come with her from Princeton and is installing calorimetry equipment. When the scientist casually uses one door that will be off-limits later, rather than two less-convenient doors that will eventually act as an airlock, Navrotsky chides her for it. Build good habits now, she says, to prevent mistakes later. Navrotsky works long hours, 60 to 70 each week, serving a host of constituencies. There is the collaboration-building among faculty. And she is teaching an undergraduate materials science class this quarter -- after altering even that to attract students from other majors. She supervises 13 graduate students, postdocs and staff who followed her from Princeton, and is actively recruiting new students. She recently flew back to Princeton for one student's doctoral defense and another's doctoral qualifying exam, then stopped at the University of Michigan to be a guest speaker. She was gone just three days. She has co-authored two dozen published articles in the past two years -- more than 225 in her career -- and has 11 more nearing print. She serves on the editorial boards of several scientific journals. She advises leading universities, such as Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, on their research and graduate-education programs. Her advice is sought nationally She was elected to the prestigious National Academy of Sciences in 1993. Her rising status has brought new demands for comment on high-level science-policy issues; she recently served on an expert panel advising the U.S. Department of Energy about the basic research needed to plan safe nuclear-waste storage. Navrotsky maps her own course, and expects students to do the same. "I am not a believer in the magical effect of inspirational figures and mentors," she says. Yet she does believe in the public university's role in "helping a student discover that he or she has a mind" and finding the best way to put that mind to work. A collaborative atmosphere is essential to that process, she says. "Increasingly, scientists have no one career-long focus. Students must be conversant with many different disciplines." Navrotsky was drawn to UC Davis because it seems to be a place where "it is desirable, and easy, to break down boundaries." "There are good people here; there's a good work ethic," she concludes. "The opportunity I see here is for a university rooted in the agricultural sciences to now take the best and most modern parts of that expertise and build on it."